


I'll Show You the Way

by lauraayates



Category: Timeless (TV 2016)
Genre: 2x03 Hollywoodland, 2x04 The Salem Witch Hunt, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternative Season 2, F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-11
Updated: 2019-02-18
Packaged: 2019-07-11 05:40:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 14,445
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15965855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lauraayates/pseuds/lauraayates
Summary: Wyatt’s phone demanding his attention is the last thing he wants right now. Lucy has his attention - she always has his attention. She’s saying something about them having nowhere to go but down. And all Wyatt wants to do is groan, and tell her not to jinx them before they’ve even begun. But if the words he’s currently reading on his phone are any indication, jinx them is exactly what Lucy has just done… / Canon divergent from 2x03, Hollywoodland.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'm probably going to regret this, and you guys are most definitely going to have to kick my ass to keep me writing this - I'm especially talking to you, my goats - but here have an alternative season 2 multi-chapter fic! 
> 
> This isn't the original prompt I had for this fic... In fact, I don't think that's going to pop up until at least chapter 3, but this is where I felt it appropriate to start! Enjoy!

Wyatt’s phone demanding his attention is the last thing he wants right now. Lucy has his attention - she always has his attention. She’s saying something about them having nowhere to go but down. And all Wyatt wants to do is groan, and tell her not to jinx them before they’ve even begun. But if the words he’s currently reading on his phone are any indication, jinx them is exactly what Lucy has just done…

 

_I have the papers. You need to sign them. When can we meet? Jess x_

 

Lucy watches as his skin pales and the smile drops straight off his face. There’s no longer any trace of the love previously shining in his eyes. Everything was just beginning to fall into place for them. Finally. And now… 

“She’s alive.” He whispers.

“What?” Lucy frowns and cocks her head him. “Wyatt, who’s alive?”

He can’t find the words to answer her. How is he supposed to tell the woman he loves that his wife is back from the dead? Instead, he simply hands his phone over to her. He watches as her eyes scan the screen, reading the text. And again, and again. By the looks of things, she’s having just as hard of a time believing the words, as he is.

“Jessica.” Lucy snaps her head up to look him in the eyes, tears threatening to fall from her own. “We must have done something in 1941. Wyatt, I- I don’t-”

Wyatt grabs her around the waist and pulls her into his embrace, bringing his forehead down to rest against hers. “What do I do, Luce? What am I supposed to do?” He takes a deep, shuddering breath. “She’s my wife… but you and I, we… I can’t lose you.”

“You won’t. I promise.” She brings her hand up to wipe away the lone tear that has escaped his eye, completely ignoring the ones now beginning to fall from her own. “Go see her. Find out what she wants. I can’t tell you what to do, what to decide. You have to figure that out for yourself.”

Wyatt presses a kiss to her forehead. “I don’t deserve you.”

“Go, while you can. I’ll cover for you here.” She reluctantly draws away from him, knowing this could be the last time he’ll ever hold her.

“If Rittenhouse jump, you call me.” He tightens the grip he has on his phone, before he slips it back into the back pocket of his jeans. He needs her to know he’s serious, he will not risk his team being sent on a mission with no one to protect them. Or worse, with Flynn to protect them. “I’m serious, Luce. You guys jump with me, or not at all.”

The nodding of her head is all he needs to reassure himself that she’ll call him. He drops one last kiss to her lips, savouring the feel of her against him; before he pulls away, nods once, and turns to find a way out of the bunker without attracting any attention.

“Lucy!” Rufus’s voice echoes down the hallway. “Check this out!”

She watches Wyatt disappear round the corner, before turning back to see what Rufus had found. “What is it?”

He’s holding a tablet when she approaches him, an article loaded on the web browser, but she can’t see what the article is about. “Uh, I told Hedy to renew her patent - which she did in 1955 - so that when the Navy uses it in the 1962 blockade of Cuba, Hedy and George still own it.”

Lucy smiles at him proudly, he did the right thing. Once upon a time, she would have blown up at him for making such a huge change to history, but after all they’ve been through, and all she knows is still to come, she can’t bring herself to care. Hedy was an incredible woman and she deserved every penny she earned from still owning that patent. She shrugs slightly. “Glad they got the credit.”

“Yeah… and about 30 billion dollars to go with it.” Rufus reveals, like it’s no big deal.

Lucy snatches the tablet from his hands. “30 billion!?” She scans the page quickly, before looking back up at him for confirmation.

“Billion.” He nods. “She quit acting, started a tech company. According to wikipedia, Bill Gates aint got nothing on Hedy Lamarr.”

* * *

 

Lucy’s just grabbing breakfast when the alarm sounds throughout the bunker. _Rittenhouse… Damnit, Mother!_ Carol had always told Lucy as a child how breakfast was the most important meal of the day, and here she was interrupting her morning meal for the 2nd day running. She glares at the freshly buttered slices of… rather burnt toast, before snatching one up and shoving half of it into her mouth, inevitably struggling to chew and swallow without choking. She can only imagine what Wyatt would say right now.

With her mouth full, and a trail of crumbs following her, Lucy makes her way from the kitchenette over to the console. “Where are they?” She struggles out around her poor excuse for breakfast.

Rufus and Jiya look at her like she has 2 heads, while Flynn comes up behind her with a: “You want to say that again in English?”

Lucy turns to glare at him as she struggles to swallow the last of her toast. “I said: Where are they?”

“Uh, Salem, Massachusetts. September 22nd, 1692.” Jiya pales as read out the date and location, glancing at Rufus in worry. “Pilgrims?”

“It’s the height of the witch trials.” Lucy’s torn. She’d promised Wyatt she would call him if they jumped, she knows they’re going to need him for this jump. Only she can’t bring herself to do it. Knowing what he’s out there doing… she has to give him more time.

Denise turns to Lucy. “Try Wyatt again. He needs to get his ass back here. Now.”

“Uh, yeah. Yeah, I’ll…” The historian utters quietly, hesitantly, before running off down the corridor towards her and Jiya’s room. There’s no way she can have this conversation in front of everyone without any of them figuring out what’s going on.

With her phone pressed tight against her ear, her head raised to the ceiling in frustration, she mutters: “Pick up, pick up, pick up.” As she paces back and forth across the room.

Wyatt answers the phone on the last ring. “Luce? You okay?”

“Wyatt.” She sighs, releasing a breath she had no idea she’d been holding. “Yeah, I’m fine. I’m just… How are you? How’s… How’s Jess?”

He echoes her sigh. How he wishes he’d never left the bunker. Being here, having seen Jessica again, he’s never been more sure of what he wants - who he wants - and it’s not the woman he’s waiting for to finish her shift. It’s Lucy. If he’s honest with himself, it’s been Lucy since she whisper-shouted “are you asleep?” at him across the waiting room at Mason Industries. It’s been Lucy since she told him she needed him at the Alamo in 1863. It’s been Lucy since he kissed her in 1934 in front of Bonnie and Clyde.

“She’s working.” He rubs a hand down his face. “I, uh, tracked her to the bar she works at.” He takes a breath. “I don’t know how to feel about how neutral she was when I walked in…”

“I’m sure there’s a reasonable explanation.” Lucy screws her eyes shut tight. Talking with the man she loves, about the woman he loves - a woman that isn’t her - is the last thing she wants to do, but it’s something she needs to do. “Maybe you guys are in a fight or something?”

He chuckles at that. “If we were fighting, I’d know. She always had a fiery temper… She says she has something I need to sign.”

That piques her curiosity. “Oh? Did she say what?” Lucy knows what she wants it to be. Divorce papers. It may be selfish on her part, but she prays she’s right.

Wyatt shakes his head, before realising Lucy can’t see him. “No. I got a motel room.” He hates the thought of Lucy thinking about him and Jessica alone in a motel room. “She’s going to drop by when she finishes her shift.”

“Oh. Okay.” Her voice is quiet. He can hear the insecurities.

“Luce… I’m sorry.” He doesn’t quite know why he’s apologising. It’s not like he asked for any of this to happen.

She sniffs once, refusing to let the tears starting to form, fall. “No. No, it’s okay. You do what you have to do.”

“Yeah.” He falls silent for a moment. “Did they jump? Is that why you called?”

“Oh! No. No, I just- I was worried about you.” Wyatt’s sure she isn’t telling him the whole truth, something is wrong. “I miss you.”

“Luce, please.” He stands abruptly. There is no way his team is jumping without him. “Tell me the truth. Rittenhouse jumped, didn’t they?”

“I-” She sighs. She hates that he can read her so well, even when he’s no where near her. “Yeah, but listen. It sounds like a quick simple mission. Rufus and I will be fine without you,. You need to do this Wyatt. You need to see Jessica.”

“I don’t care how simple it sounds. You’re not jumping without me.” He doesn’t say good bye before he hangs up the phone.

Lucy sighs, before she reluctantly makes her way back into the common room. She’s about to tell them that he’s on his way back - he didn’t say it, but she knows him, just as well as he knows her - when Denise’s phone rings. The agent pulls the phone from her back pocket and glances at the screen. Frowning, she looks at Lucy.“It’s Wyatt.”

* * *

 

Wyatt curses as he hangs up the phone with Lucy. He wastes no time in finding another contact in his phone: Agent Christopher. Lucy isn’t going to be happy with him for doing this, but he doesn’t care. She can be as angry at him as she wants. As long as he’s the one in that third seat when they jump.

He doesn’t give Denise the chance to say a word when she answers her phone. “Do _not_ let them jump without me! Understand?”

She sighs down the phone. He can imagine the irate look on her face in this moment… He _doesn’t_ want to imagine the trouble he’s going to be in when he returns. “Well, you better hurry up and get back here then.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: The first 900 words or so (everything from the start to the first line break) is a hell of a lot of information. It's basically all Wyatt/Jess background, and I've been told may give you WyJess feels. Feel free to skip that part, as honestly, I only wrote all that to flesh out the chapter and avoid re-writing the Salem episode. I hate doing that, so I want to do it as little as possible in this fic! 
> 
> Whether you read all that or not, enjoy!

It’s almost an hour and a half later when Wyatt makes it back to the bunker. When you’re in a rush to get somewhere, everything turns against you. It’s always the way. 

He remembers the day he married Jess. The guys he was serving with at the time had thought it would be a good idea to go out the night before. One last hurrah before he was tied to the same woman for the rest of his life, they’d said. He’d agreed to go for one drink, two at the most. Only one drink turned into two, two into three, three into four, and before he knew it, he was blackout drunk and professing his love for a streetlight. Of course, being so drunk had meant that the next morning he’d slept straight through his alarm. And of course, it being his wedding day, everything from there had gone downhill. To say Jess was pissed when he eventually made it to the hotel, where the ceremony would take place, 40 minutes late and more hungover than he’d ever been, would be an understatement. She had only talked to him when necessary for the rest of the day, and not at all for the rest of the week. He was due to be deployed only 2 days after she began speaking to him again, leaving them very little time to enjoy being man and wife, before he was off saving the world again. Maybe he should have taken that as the first sign.

Thinking back on his wedding day, has Wyatt’s thoughts drifting back to the rest of his relationship with Jess. They’d met in high school. She was the one no one really took much notice of. She wasn’t the smartest in the school, or the prettiest, or the most popular. She was just an average girl, with average grades, trying to make her way through school like everyone else. Only when Wyatt saw her for the first time across that crowded hallway, between second and third period on that cold winter morning, there was something about her that just… hit him. The lightening bolt. He knew he had to know her. It didn’t matter that he was nothing like her. He was seen as the school bad boy. The boy that had a troubled home life. The boy that had poor grades and was always in detention. The boy no one wanted to be associated with. Except her. She’d caught his eye across the hallway, and sent him a confused look and a small wave. The first of many. The confused look was soon exchanged for a friendly smile, still always accompanied by a small wave. By the second semester, they were exchanging a quick “Hi, how’re you doing?” between classes. By the third semester, he’d plucked up the courage to ask her out for burgers and milkshakes after school. She’d teased him when he asked her, saying something about being sure I could fit her in between all my detention dates. They’d been pretty much attached at the hip after that.

Being with Jess through school had been easy. She was a simple girl, with simple pleasures. She didn’t expect him to shower her with gifts everyday - like some of the other girls in school would have done - which was a good thing, because he could barely afford the few things he did buy for her. Being with Jess once they’d both left school and he’d joined the military, however, was a different story. 

The first few years - while he was still training, before he joined delta force - weren’t too bad. He wasn’t deployed as often, and he could tell her minor details about the missions they sent him on - nothing important, but enough to keep her happy - he was even able to video call with her at times. But once he’d made it onto the elite team, that’s when everything changed. The missions he was sent on were longer, harder, more often, and of course, more classified. Often times, he couldn’t even tell her where in the world they were sending him. The secrets, and all the time apart, put a strain on their relationship. When he was home she’d ask him where he’d been sent, how his mission went, if he’d been with anyone he’d worked with before. When he refused to tell her, she blew up at him. She’d argue that she was his wife and she had a right to know. He’d argue back that his missions were classified, and that he could get into serious trouble for telling her anything about them. There were times he’d ask for another mission just to avoid another argument with her. Of course that would create another, larger argument when he eventually made it home. Maybe he should have taken that as the second sign.

And then Syria happened. He was forced to leave behind his team, his friends. They were all killed out there and he couldn’t tell anyone how or why. The guilt weighed on him heavily. The arguments following that mission were louder and longer. There were many times before that he’d thought about leaving. But after Syria, he’d made the decision that it would be the best thing for both of them.

Now though… Now he had another decision to make. Does he forget everything that went wrong between them; honour the vow he made to her when they were both just 19 years old, and give their marriage another shot? Or does he accept that they’re not quite right for each other and explore the possibilities with Lucy? His heart and his mind are screaming two different things at him.

* * *

 

No alarm echoes this time, as the guards at the door let him back inside. He sends them a sheepish smile in return, a ‘sorry for knocking you out before’. 

Wyatt’s not quite sure what to expect when he enters the bunker, but Lucy launching herself at him in one of her attack hugs, is not it. In hindsight, he probably should have expected that… It’s not the first time she’s done it and he highly doubts it’ll be the last. He braces himself for the impact, catching her easily, before wrapping his arms tight around her waist.

“Good to see you too.” He chuckles, burying his face into the crook of her neck, just like she has done to him.

“This reunion is touching and all, but can we get back to the whole ‘stopping Rittenhouse ruining history’ thing.” Rufus speaks up from his seat next to Jiya at the console, smirking at his two friends as they reluctantly untangle themselves, though not straying far from each other.

Denise steps forward. “Which I’m sure they’ve already done by now.” She turns to Wyatt and narrows her eyes at him. “Just what was so important that you had to break out of here and knock out two of my guys?”

“Uh…” Wyatt hesitates, rubbing at the back of his neck with the hand that isn’t currently resting on the small of Lucy’s back. He glances at the woman stood next to him, only to see her shake her head at him slightly. “It’s a long story. Best left for a time when history isn’t being ripped apart.”

The agent narrows her eyes at him suspiciously. “Fine, get going then. We can talk about this when you get back.”

He nods once. “Yes, ma’am.”

Lucy elbows him in the side and narrows her eyes at him, her message loud and clear: don’t call anyone else ma’am. He smirks at the glare on her face, he always knew she loved it when he called her that.

“Okay, you two are going to make me vomit.” Rufus tells them on his was past them to the Lifeboat. He stops short, when he realises they aren’t following him. “You guys coming? Or am I stopping them on my own this time?”

Wyatt rolls his eyes at Lucy, before guiding her over to the time machine. 

“Yeah…” Rufus mutters, watching his love struck colleagues. “I love playing third wheel.”

* * *

 

Lucy wouldn’t say their mission was a success, but she wouldn’t say they failed miserably either. They all got out of there alive, which if Rittenhouse had had their way, wouldn’t have happened. She wasn’t quite sure how to process the fact that her mother had lead them there in order to have her killed.

Taking a moment to reorient herself, as the Lifeboat pops back into the 21st century and lands in the bunker with a loud, metallic clunk, she fails to register Wyatt leaning forward to undo her seatbelts. Her eyes are screw shut tightly, and she’s breathing deeply, willing away the pain flaring up in her arm. It’s taking everything in her not to through up the little she holds in her stomach.

“You good?” Wyatt asks, worried about the state of the woman in front of him.

“HmmMmm.” She mumbles in return, her voice barely audible. Her eyes pop open and she smiles at him softly.

Wyatt nods a head towards the door, thats just beginning to slide open. “Let’s get you out of here, and patched up properly.”

As he stands up, he takes her hand to help her to her feet, supporting her around the waist with his other arm as he helps her out onto the steps. 

None of them take much notice of the extra body in the room, as they make their way down the steps and towards the sofas at the other end of the room. Both men focused on getting Lucy seated and the wound on her arm cleaned and patched up properly before it becomes infected. 

Seeing the state the historian is in, she doesn’t say a word. She just stands back and watches as Jiya fetches the first aid kit, and Wyatt uses the little medical knowledge he has from his time in the military, to help the other woman. It isn’t until she speaks up, a worried: “Is she going to be okay?” that the three heads snap towards her. 

Wyatt pales at the sight of her stood there. _She wasn’t… How is she…_ “Jess?”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shadow of the Tomb Raider was finally released on Friday, so I apologise now if updates aren't as frequent for the next few weeks, while I'm off in South America raiding some tombs with my old pal, Lara Croft.

The three time travellers look at her like she has three heads. With everything that she’s learnt since Wyatt stumbled back into her life, it wouldn’t surprise her if there was someone out there with such a condition. Jess is half tempted to find the nearest mirror, just to double check that it isn’t her, that she does only have one head. She frowns at them, confused. _Why are they looking at me like that?_

Wyatt stands from where he’s crouched beside Lucy, stepping towards his wife. “Jess… How are you here?”

And now she’s even more confused. “What do you mean ‘how am I here’? You brought me here!”

“No. No, I didn’t.” Wyatt’s shaking his head, looking to everyone in the room, hoping one of them can offer up an explanation. No one does. “I came to see you at the bar, you were working. You were going to come meet me after your shift, but I had to leave before you showed up.”

Jess shrugs, not quite sure what to say. “That’s not how I remember it…”

“The timelines must have changed again.” Lucy speaks up from the sofa she’s laying across, her voice weaker than any of them would like it to be.

Hearing her voice so weak, Wyatt turns and crouches back down beside her. “Shhh…. Don’t try to talk.” He begins to run his hand through her hair.

“You used to do that for me, when I was ill.” Jess’s voice is quiet. She’s not quite sure why she just said that. 

Sensing an awkwardness building in the atmosphere, Jiya steps forward. “Um.. Maybe you two should go talk and clear things up, while we get Lucy patched up?”

Wyatt hesitates, not wanting to leave her. He stares at the two women for a moment, his glaze flicking back and forth between the two. 

Seeing the other man’s conflict, Rufus steps forward and lays a hand against the top of his friends back. “Go.” He cocks his head towards the bedrooms. “I’ll look after her.”

The soldier nods his head slowly, not for the first time wishing he’d never accepted this damn assignment, despite that meaning he’d have never met the people he’s come to think of as his family. His life was a whole lot more straight forward before he was introduced to time travel. Although, he supposes everyone here would say the same. 

“Wyatt.” 

His head snaps towards the small voice on the sofa. Lucy doesn’t say anything when he looks at her. She just sends him a small smile - one he’s pretty sure she’s reserved just for him - and hopes he understands everything she wants to say, but can’t bring herself to voice out loud right now, especially while surrounded by so many people.

“Yeah.” He nods his head at her, returning her smile.

* * *

 

 

“So, you and Lucy…” Jess doesn’t look at him as she says the other woman’s name. She can’t. 

How the hell is he supposed to explain all of this to her? “Jess… I-”

“It’s okay. I know about the time travel, and Rittenhouse, and everything.” She takes a seat on one of the beds - she’s not sure who’s it is, she doesn’t even know who’s room they’re in - and pats the space beside her, telling him to take a seat also. “Maybe I should tell you what I remember, and then you can tell me what you remember?”

Wyatt nods his consent, not trusting himself to speak right now.

Jess takes a deep breath before beginning. “Um… We wanted to start a family, but I wanted you here with me, and not running off at the drop of a hat, disappearing for days on end. I asked you to leave active duty, but you didn’t want to. Said you couldn’t just leave your team. We fought a lot about it. You’d told me about this new team you were a part of, and one day I was just so… angry at the whole situation, that I accused you of cheating on me with Lucy.” She smirks and shakes her head slightly. “I guess I was right about that par-”

“-It wasn’t like that. I would never do that to you.” Wyatt protested, not quite sure what to make of what she’s said so far.

“You wouldn’t, no, but… I wouldn’t put it past the other you.” Jess puts her hand up to stop him, when she sees him go to protest again. “The version of you I remember he- I’m sorry, but he turned out to be more like your father, than any of us ever thought… hoped he would.”

“I-” He shakes his head in disbelief. “I don’t really know what to say. ‘Sorry’ doesn’t seem like enough.”

“You have nothing to apologise for.” She turns and smirks at him then. “Except, maybe, for making me believe you were dead for 2 months…”

Wyatt turns and frowns at her. _Why the hell did-_ “The explosion at Mason Industries.”

“Yeah…” Jess nods. “Before the explosion, we did nothing but argue. It wasn’t pretty, but when I was told you were dead, I forgot about every reason I had for being mad at you. I turned my anger around on myself. I knew how much being a part of the military, of delta force and then this new team, meant to you; yet I expected you to drop everything because I wanted a child.

“I thought I was seeing things when you walked into the bar the other day. I thought you were dead, and then all of a sudden there you were, asking to talk. And when I met you after my shift, you got a call and dragged me off with you to some underground bunker. I didn’t know what to think. Especially when you started sprouting nonsense about time travel, and timelines changing. Of course, I didn’t believe a word of what you said. Not until you, Lucy, and Rufus, climbed into that machine and…”

Wyatt chuckles slightly at the look on her face. “At least you had a little warning before experiencing it all. I had about 2 minutes, before I was pretty much forced up into that eyeball and hurtling through time.”

“To 1937, right? Or was ’34 your first mission?” It’s Jess’s turn to laugh at the look on his face. “Connor, Denise, and Jiya, caught me up on… well, everything, while you were gone.”

“Right… Right.” It’s a lot to process. From the sounds things, this other version of him was everything he had tried his hardest not to be. No matter how much it hurt, how much he missed her, and how much she didn’t deserve it, Wyatt’s starting to feel… glad ideally wouldn’t be the word he would use, but it’s the only one he can think of right now, that Jess was taken from him.

Before her death, he’d begun to feel himself spiral. He wanted to reach for a bottle, just like his old man had when things got tough. It was a part of the reason he’d thought about asking for a divorce, and walking away. It was the last thing he had wanted to happen. He had loved her more than he thought possible, probably more than was healthy, but he knew if he stuck around, things would get far uglier than they already had. 

Jess lays a hand on his forearm, bringing him back to the present. “What about you? What do you remember?”

Wyatt tells her about his time with the team. The details only he, Rufus, and Lucy knew. He tells her about the people in history they’ve met, about Ian Fleming and Wendell Scott, Marie Curie and Hedy Lamarr. He tells her how much they’d fought, how he felt himself wanting to reach for a bottle to numb everything. How he’d thought about asking for a divorce and walking away. It wasn’t easy telling her about her death, about how he’d left her on the side of the road after one of their worst fights.

Telling her about Lucy, was the hardest part. About how she saved him from himself, about how they grew close and how he fought his growing feelings for her, but ultimately he couldn’t deny what he felt for her. It may have been hard for Wyatt to tell Jess about her, but it was harder for her to listen to her husband talk about the woman that had captured his heart. The woman that wasn’t her. She understood though. This Wyatt had lost her. He’d grieved for her and punished himself for far too long. Lucy had pulled him out of his depression, had saved him. And she cannot thank the historian enough for that. 

“So what happens now?” Wyatt raises his eyes, from where they were previously trained on a stain on the floor, to look at Jess.

She sighs. She wants to demand that he honour the vow he made when they married. Demand that he forget about Lucy, and stay with her. But she can’t. At the end of the day, all she wants is for Wyatt to be happy. And if that isn’t with her, if he decides he’s happiest with Lucy, then she has to accept that.

“You need to decide what you want. Who you want.”

* * *

 

 

“How is she?” Wyatt asks as he enters the room the girls share. Lucy is laid out on her bed, her skin has paled immeasurably, and though there’s sweat on her brow, she’s visibly shivering.

Rufus looks up from where he was bring the covers up to tuck around her. He smiles, wistfully at his friend, and shakes his head. “Not good, man. She has a fever.”

Wyatt nods and approaches the bed. He collapses into the empty chair Rufus had waiting for him. How he wishes he could go back to that morning in Hollywood. He’d woken up to Lucy stroking her hand across his face and down his arm. Whisperings of good mornings, and worries about working together while being together. Heated kisses, and wandering hands. One last round for the road, after Rufus had left them. He sighs deeply, as he runs his hands down his face. 

“We’ve done all we can. It’s up to her to fight off this infection now.” Rufus says. “She’s tough. She’s got this.” He’s more confident than Wyatt is.

“I can’t lose her, Rufus. I can’t.” Wyatt’s close to tears. Never before, has he felt such a wide range of emotions in such a short period of time.

“I know.” Rufus doesn’t have the words to reassure his friend. Especially not now his wife - _ex-wife?_ \- had been thrown into the mix.

“Jess, she uh…” Wyatt blinks once, twice, trying to put his thoughts into words. “In her timeline, she finished work early, met me before I had to leave.” He puffs out a laugh. “Barely though. She said she turned up to the motel I was at and I basically kidnapped her.”

“That’s where you were? Meeting her?” Rufus confirms.

Wyatt nods, slowly, hoping his friend won’t judge him too harshly for his actions. “Yeah. She text me when Lucy and I were talking. It was the last thing either of us expected, or wanted. I didn’t know what to do. Lucy and I had just… you know, and then all of a sudden my wife is alive and well, asking to meet. I still don’t know what she wanted.”

“Wait, you just left Lucy, without a word? To go meet your wife? After you’d just admitted that you were in love with Lucy?” Rufus frowns at his friend. “You idiot!”

“What!? No!” He gestures towards the woman in front of them. “I showed her the message, asked her what I should do. She told me that I had to figure that out for myself, but that I should go see her.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“What am I supposed to do!?” Wyatt stands, the chair toppling over in his frustration. “You know how I feel about Lucy, but… She’s my wife, Rufus. I made a vow to her. I can’t-”

Rufus stands and cautiously approaches his friend. He puts his hands on his shoulders, forces him to stop and listen to him. “Stop. Just… stop overthinking this. Forget about vows and promises and everything that’s happened with both of them. How do you feel? Think about who you makes you happier, and you have your answer.”

“Who makes me happier…” He nods, almost in a daze. “I can do that.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologise for the delay in this chapter... I was off raiding tombs in South America. But now that I've finished playing Shadow of the Tomb Raider (it was so freaking good!!! and I hate that I got through it so quickly! I'm so tempted to go back and play this trilogy again!!) updates should be more frequent... I'm not going to promise that though...
> 
> Also, thankyou to Brooklyn for letting me steal doctor!Michelle!

It’s been 3 days. 3 days since they returned from 1692. 3 days since Lucy was injured saving the women of Salem, and ultimately doing something he’d never thought he’d see her do… change history. 3 days that Wyatt has spent sat at her bedside, day and night, praying to any god that will listen for her to wake up and be okay. A part of him hopes that this break Rittenhouse seem to be giving them is Carol’s influence. The woman may be the reason they were caught in the middle of the Salem Witch Trials to begin with, but if he’s right, if this is her influence, then there’s a chance she can be saved. There’s a chance they can convince her to betray Rittenhouse and help them destroy them. There’s a chance Lucy does have some family left. But there’s also a part of him that doesn’t want that, no matter how much more pain it will cause Lucy… _What kind of mother sends her daughter to be hung as a witch?_

There was a time in his life, when Wyatt didn’t even know Lucy existed. Now? Now, he can’t imagine his life without her in it. Whether that’s just as friends, if he decides to try things again with Jess, or as something more if he decides to finally put the past behind him. 

His brain is telling him to honour the vow he made to Jess, to give their marriage another chance. Right now - sat at Lucy’s side, not knowing whether or not she’s going to wake up and be okay - his heart is screaming at him to choose the unconscious woman in front of him. But he knows that as soon as he see’s Jess again, as soon as he’s reminded of all they once had, and all they could have again, his heart and his brain will switch camps. His brain will argue for Lucy, and his heart will argue for Jess… _So, where does that leave me?_

“I can hear you thinking from out in the common room…” Jiya says from the doorway, a sympathetic look on her face. 

That look is all he’s gotten from the few people he’s seen in the last few days, and he just wishes they’d stop. He doesn’t need their sympathy. He just needs Lucy to wake up, for her to tell him that everything’s going to be okay. 

Jiya smirks and steps into the room. “She’s a fighter… She’s going to wake up and kick your ass for moping around here for 3 days.” 

“She can kick my ass as much as she likes, as long it means she’s awake and going to be okay.” Wyatt’s eyes never stray from where they’re focused on her chest. He’s too scared that if he looks away, it’ll stop rising and falling, a sure sign that she’s alive and breathing.

“I brought you some food.” She holds up the plate in her hands. He hadn’t realised how hungry he was until he laid eyes on the plate. “I didn’t think you’d want to leave her long enough to get some yourself.”

“Thanks.” Wyatt smiles and accepts the food. Jiya isn’t someone he’s really made the effort to get to know throughout this whole thing, and in this moment he’s starting to wonder why. “You’re a goo-”

He cuts himself off when the hand he’s holding tightens it’s grip. Wyatt snaps his head towards the woman on the bed, hope rising within him for the first time in what feels like a lifetime. “What? What is it?” Jiya steps forward, her eyes flicking between her two friends.

“She squeezed my hand.” A smile tugs at the corners of his lips. “Luce? Come on, Professor. Open your eyes, just… please.”

Her voice is hoarse and her throat dry. It’s a struggle for her to get the words out but one is clear. “Wyatt.” He’s never been so happy to hear his name.

He brings their clasped hands up to his lips, his free hand moving to brush the hair off of her face. “I’m here. I’m right here.”

“Here.” Neither of them had noticed Jiya leave the room, or return, but the bottle of water she’s now holding out to them certainly wasn’t in here before. 

He takes the bottle with a small nod, before turning back to Lucy. The alarm suddenly echoing through the bunker is the last sound he wants to hear, as he brings the bottle to her lips, holding her head up slightly.

“I’ll go see what’s going on.” Jiya slips out of the room, leaving the pair alone once more.

Lucy’s eyes pop open, clearly surprised by the sound. It’s seconds before she’s screwing them shut tight and squirming in an attempt to get as far away from the noise as possible. The covers tucked tightly around her do nothing to help.

Seeing her distress, Wyatt moves from the chair he’s occupied for 3 days, to perch on the side of her bed. He presses a hand to the mattress at the other side of her, keeping his weight off her as he leans over her. “Shh… It’s okay.” 

“No, no, no.”

Wyatt squeezes his hands between her body and the mattress, as he pulls her up into his arms. Wrapped in his embrace, she soon calms down, her breathing evening slowly as unconsciousness takes over once more.

“That’s it.” Wyatt lowers her back down, tucking the covers back around her. “Rest. I’ll go see what all the noise is about.”

* * *

“Where’d they go?”

The words sail right over his head as he fastens the buttons on his shirt. It may not be historically accurate for 1934, but it’s the best they can do in their current situation.

“Hey!” Jess steps into the room, and waves a hand in his face. “Earth to Wyatt…”

He snaps his head up in her direction, frowning slightly… _How is she- Oh, right! The timelines._ “Huh?”

“Righthouse? Where’d they go?” Seeing him fumble with the buttons, she steps in and fastens the rest of the shirt for him. It’s more intimate than they’ve been in years.

“Rittenhouse, they umm… 1934. We don’t know why.” He all but ignores her as he leaves the room and heads towards the lifeboat. The quicker they leave, the quicker they can put a stop to whatever Rittenhouse has planned, the quicker he can get back to Lucy.

Rufus is up at the console with Jiya, making sure they’re good to go when he and Jess make it to the lifeboat. He’s not sure where Flynn is, and honestly he couldn’t care less. 

“Good to go?” Wyatt stops by the console, as Rufus presses one last button, before turning to say a quick goodbye to Jiya.

“Yup, you?” Rufus slaps him on the back as he climbs into the lifeboat first.

“As I’ll ever be.” He shrugs, following the pilot up into the giant eyeball. “The sooner we stop them, the sooner I can get back to where I need to be.”

“Good luck!” Jess calls to them both from bellow somewhere.

Rufus turns to Wyatt, and sends him a look the soldier can’t quite decipher. “Oh, man. The missus and the ex… welcome to every man’s worst nightmare.” 

Flynn pauses in the doorway as he climbs in. “You just quoted something, didn’t you?”

The two men glare at the ex-time bandit. The last thing they want is to go on this trip with Garcia Flynn, but they weren’t really given any other choice.

* * *

 When the lifeboat returns, Lucy is stood at the console with Jiya. They watch as Wyatt and Rufus climb from the lifeboat, pulling an unconscious figure out with them. A glimpse of the man’s face has Lucy groaning, as she brings her hand up to pinch the bridge of her nose. “Please tell me that’s not who I think is.”

“It’s not who you think it is.” She begins to sigh with relief at Rufus’s words, until… “Unless you think it’s a young JFK, then it’s definitely who you think it is.”

“This is why you guys should not travel without me.” She mumbles to herself, before snapping her head back up to look at them, a determined look in her eye. “Okay. It’s not the end of world. So, he’s not in the right time period. It could be worse. Yeah, it could be so much worse. He could be dead, he could be in the hands of Rittenhouse, he could… Who am I kidding!? This is a disaster.”

Wyatt transfers the weight of the future - past? - president to Rufus, leaving him free to approach the panicking historian. He grips her arms, putting a stop to her pacing, before he runs his hands up her arms to cradle her face between his palms. “Stop. Breathe.”

Lucy nods quickly, following his instructions.

“Better?”

She shakes her head, no. Breaking free of Wyatt’s hold on her, she begins to pace again. “Why the hell did you think this was a good idea!?”

“Well, our only other option was to let Emma kill him, so…” Rufus shrugs from across the room, where he’d just dropped the unconscious form of JFK to the sofa in the common area.

Lucy calms a little at his words. “Okay, yeah… this is preferable to that alternative.” _Neither would have happened at all, if you’d let me go though…_ She begins to nod slowly. “Um… Why don’t you guys try and get him conscious. Wyatt, can we talk?” 

Not many people have asked him that question in his life time, but every time they have, it’s never been good news. He doubts this time is any different. He nods slowly, hesitant in answering. “Uh… Yeah? Yeah, sure.”

* * *

“So, um… What did you want to talk about?” 

Wyatt’s visibly nervous, and it’s cutest thing Lucy has ever seen. She lets him sweat a little longer, smiling softly at him, which only makes him sweat more.

“Relax, Wyatt. You’re not in trouble.” She laughs slightly as he releases a deep breath. “Agent Christopher brought her wife here to check my arm while you were gone.”

Wyatt frowns and cocks his head slightly. “Why would she do that?”

She mirrors his cocked head. “Turns out Michelle is a doctor.”

“Okay…” His eyes flick to where he knows the wound sits on her arm beneath the sleeve of her shirt… or is that his shirt? “What did she say? Are you okay?”

Lucy brings her hands up to smooth over his face, as if to wipe away all his worries. “I’m perfectly fine. It looked a lot worse than it actually is.”

Wyatt breathes a second sigh of relief in as many minutes. This conversation isn’t doing any good for his health.

“I um… when she took some blood to run tests, I also asked her too check that other thing we talked about before you left.”

Her words confirm something he’s been suspicious of since he returned. Another timeline shift. Before he left, Lucy was barely conscious, and now she’s up and about as if the cut on her arm was nothing more than a paper cut. Which for all he knows, in this timeline it could well be just that. “You… uh…-”

“You were right.” Her smile is wide, and she looks happier than he’s ever seen her. 

How is he supposed to respond when he has no idea what she’s talking about? He itches to tell her - he knows he should - but he can’t let himself dampen her mood. After everything they’ve been through, she deserves this moment of joy. Instead he mirrors her smile and prompts her to continue.

“I’m pregnant.”


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shit. Shit, shit, shit. He should not have said that. The things Emma - Rittenhouse could do to him, and Lucy, and their child... He stops breathing - though he’s not sure he actually begun again after Emma first took Lucy hostage - as he watches the realisation build in Emma’s eyes. “Them?” Her eyebrows all but disappear into her hairline. “Oh, Princess. What is your mother going to say?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologise for the delay. I have no excuse. 
> 
> I have a plan for the rest of this fic. I've laid out 7 chapters, with an epilogue that will possibly be split into 2 chapters - making 8, maybe 9 chapters in total. I can't promise they'll be written and posted any time soon. I write when I feel like it, when I'm inspired, and when I have the time too. Unfortunately, those things rarely happen all at once. 
> 
> In the mean time, enjoy this chapter, and don't forget to go and retweet the Timeless writer's tweet to release the final deleted scene!

It’s been a few hours since the boys got back from 1934. A few hours since she’d told Wyatt she was pregnant. He’d left the room without a word, and she hasn’t seen or heard from him since. She isn’t worried about him - not physically at least, but emotionally… that’s another story. The shift in the timeline means this isn’t the Wyatt she knows. This isn’t the Wyatt that picked her up, and spun her around until they were both feeling rather sea sick, when she’d told him about her suspicions. She has no idea where this Wyatt is with his Lucy, but if his reaction is anything to go by she isn’t too hopeful for their future.

Rufus barges into the room, snapping her out of her thoughts. “He’s awake.”

Right, Kennedy. She’d almost forgotten about him. She stands and follows Rufus down the corridor to the only room in the bunker with a door that locks. She can hear the future - past? - president shouting at the rest of her team. He’s accusing them of kidnapping him, and demanding to speak to his parents. “If money is what you want, call my parents and they’ll give you every penny they have. Just let me go!”

“John, you need to calm down.” She says as she enters the room.

He turns to her, his eyes wide and wild. “Calm down!? You people kidnapped me, and you want me to calm down?”

“They didn’t kidna-” She pauses. “Okay, yeah. They kidnapped you, but only to save your life. The red-head that was after you? She would have killed you otherwise.”

“And how do I know you people won’t kill me?” He has a point.

Wyatt steps forward and shrugs at him - Lucy hadn’t registered that he was even in the room, but of course he’d be here.“You don’t, but just give us a few hours and let our… friend… deal with the guys trying to kill you, and I promise you, we’ll take you home.”

She see’s Wyatt struggle over the word ‘friend’ when he talks about Flynn. Okay, so they hadn’t gone to the Titanic. Flynn hadn’t saved Wyatt’s life. They didn’t air out their differences. They weren’t friends. That’s a change in the timeline she can handle. She just wishes it was the only one.

Lucy doesn’t say a word to anyone as she leaves the room and heads to the kitchen. She’s not sure anyone even noticed her leave, but she needs to keep herself busy to keep her mind from wandering, and making Kennedy some food seems like the best way to do that right now. She may not be the best cook in the bunker, but she can handle making a sandwich.

She grabs some bread from the cupboard; and the mustard, some salad, and the sliced meat from the fridge. It’s not to everyone’s tastes.

Making a sandwich doesn’t keep her busy for as long as she would have liked. She’s done in a matter of minutes, before she’s sliding it onto a plate and carrying it down the corridor to deliver to the young president. 

When she reaches his room, she finds it empty. “Guys? Guys!”

Turns out if you kidnap a guy and lock him in a room, but promise to return him in a few hours, he’s going to try and escape anyway. Everyone comes running when Lucy calls out to them, skidding into the room to find her holding a sandwich and starring at an open vent in the wall. A quick glance around the room tells them why. John F. Kennedy has escaped from their secret underground bunker and is currently running around 2018 on his own.

“Remember when I said this was a disaster and you all told me to calm down?” Lucy turns to them accusingly. This is why they shouldn’t travel without her.

“So he’s running around a different time period - you guys do it all the time - whats the worst that could happen?” Jess shrugs. 

Lucy shakes her head and storms off. If she has to go out there and find him herself, she will. No one else seems to be too concerned about the missing president. 

Rufus and Jiya send each other awkward looks, as Wyatt sighs and runs after her. “Luce, where are you going?”

* * *

 

When he catches up to Lucy, she’s struggling with the huge metal door that leads to their freedom. “Lucy, come on. You can’t go out there alone.”

Lucy ignores him as she continues to struggle with the door. She’s getting no where. _Does she even know Agent Christopher keeps it locked?_

“Lucy, stop!”

She turns around, her eyes wide and frantic. “What, Wyatt!?”

“We need to be smart about this.” He steps forward and brings his hands to her cheeks, forcing her to look at him. “Go get dressed. I’ll talk to Agent Christopher about getting us a car and getting out there to look for him, okay?”

She takes a moment and to take him in. He’s not sure what she’s looking for, but moments later she must have found it, because she’s nodding her head and leaning into him. Wyatt drops a kiss to her forehead and wraps his arms around her shoulders, pulling her into his embrace. 

They’re stood there for a minute or two before he feels her begin to shake in his arms. She’s crying. He pulls back and brings his hands back up to her face, wiping her tears away. “What’s wrong?”

Lucy pulls away from him, and shakes her head. “No, nothing.”

He goes to protest - it’s clearly not nothing - but she’s broken away from him and is running back down the corridor towards her bunk, before he can even open his mouth to begin to talk. He sighs deeply, running a hand down his face. Maybe giving her some space would be a good idea - not that he’s had too many of those recently.

* * *

 

No one had quite known what to say when Jess had offered to accompany them to find the young president. But with a historian, two engineers, and a former billionaire on their team, it’s not like they could say no. He’d certainly tried to, but of course he should have known that she wouldn’t take no for an answer. When she’d fired back, “Well, she’s just a teacher, right?”, they really had no choice. 

So here he was, his wife sat beside him in the passenger seat, and the woman he loves sat behind him in the back, while they drive around the Oakland area looking for a young Kennedy. Not exactly how he imagined he’d ever spend a day. 

They’ve always had a cover when they’ve done this. More often than not, they’ve either been engaged or married. But that’s always been in the past, where being a married woman would get Lucy into more places. He forgets for a moment that they’re still in the present, and she doesn’t need to be married to do anything. She can do anything she wants, without having to have him there with her. So when she tells him “You’re my friend. We can be friends, can’t we?” He’s more offended than he thought he would be - probably more than he has any right to be.

* * *

 

He’s not quite sure what Jess is trying to do when they reach the hospital - she starts reminiscing about their time in Hawaii, and the last time they were in a hospital together. A glance at Lucy tells him this trip down memory lane hurts her more than she’d ever admit to. He tries to put a stop to it, hurting Lucy is the last thing he ever wants to do, but Jess doesn’t seem to be having any of it. So he sends Lucy a look that he hopes conveys how sorry he is that this is happening. She returns his small smile and nods slightly. _It’s okay. You guys have a past. We can’t avoid that._

His world stops spinning when they find Emma in the hospital. The red-head grabs Lucy and brings a knife up to press against her throat. Wyatt draws his gun, but he doesn’t click the safety off. He doesn’t have a clean shot and there is no way he’s risking the shot. Not with Lucy and his baby between him and his target.

“Ah, ah.” Emma nods her head to the weapon clutched tightly in his hands. “Gun down, or your girlfriend here gets more than a little paper cut.”

Emma presses the knife tighter to Lucy’s throat, as Wyatt hesitates in lowering his gun. The blade nicks her skin, drawing blood. His eyes follow the drops down the smooth skin of her throat, and he watches as they soak into the neck of her t-shirt.

“Though maybe her life doesn’t matter to you, now that you have your wife back.”

Right, Jessica. He’d almost forgotten she was here. He can only imagine what she’s thinking right now. She knows him as a soldier. One who does what he needs to do, no matter who gets hurt. A reckless hot-head, as Lucy once put it. A bull in a china shop, Jess had called him on more than one occasion. Yet here he was, with a shot he’d made a million times before, and he can’t do it. He can’t take that risk.

Once upon a time he wouldn’t have hesitated in taking this shot - once upon a time he didn’t hesitate in taking this shot. He’s just that good _._ But that was before he really knew Lucy, before they fell into bed, and before she fell pregnant with his child. Before he fell in love with her.

“Please.” He begs. Wyatt takes his finger off the trigger, and holds his hands up to Emma in surrender. “Please, don’t hurt them.”

_Shit. Shit, shit, shit._ He should not have said that. The things Emma - Rittenhouse could do to him, and Lucy, and their child... He stops breathing - though he’s not sure he actually begun again after Emma first took Lucy hostage - as he watches the realisation build in Emma’s eyes.

“Them?” Her eyebrows all but disappear into her hairline. “Oh, Princess. What is your mother going to say?” 

Wyatt catches Lucy’s eye and does everything he can to convey how sorry he is that he let their secret slip. He’s not sure she understands or not, as she nods her head at him once. Before any of them know what’s happening, Lucy is bringing her foot up, and slamming the heel of her boot back down on Emma’s foot as hard as she can. 

Emma shows no reaction to any kind of pain, as she shoves Lucy at Wyatt and makes her escape. He should go after Emma. This could be their chance to end Rittenhouse - or at least cut off one of their heads - but he can’t bring himself to do it. Not when Lucy is at his feet, her head bowed, and a hand clutching at the cut on her neck. 

Wyatt drops to his knees in front of her, running his hands up her arms, around her shoulders, and pulling her into his embrace. He presses a kiss to the crown of her head. “It’s okay. She’s gone. I've got you.”

Lucy pulls back and searches his eyes. He’s just as torn up as she expected him to be. More so, even. She drops forward and rests her forehead against his, closing her eyes and revelling in his presence. “You should go after her.”

“No.” He tightens his hold on her. “I’m not leaving you here like this.”

“I’m okay.” She smiles softly. She didn’t think she’d get this level of care and affection from him again, not after Jessica’s return. There’s no guarantee it’ll last though, he’s not officially told her what he plans to do. For all she knows, he’s chosen to honour the vows he made to Jess when they married, and this is just a moment of weakness. She tucks that thought to the back of her mind, the pain in her neck from Emma’s little gift is all she can handle right now. “Jess is here, she’ll loo-”

When Lucy lifts her head to look at the other woman - who they both assume is stood at the other side of the room, where Lucy had pushed her when they’d found Wyatt and Emma - she finds her gone. “Wyatt, Jess is gone.”

His head snaps up at her words. “She’s what!?”

Ignoring the pain throbbing in her throat and the blood still trickling down her neck, Lucy stands and begins to make her way out of the room. “Where is she? Did she run off after Emma? Did Emma take her?”

Wyatt catches up to her before she can get too far. He grips her shoulders and pulls her to him, slipping one arm down to her waist in an attempt to keep her still. “Calm down. Let’s get you checked in and your neck looked at first. You’re beginning to loose too much blood.” She’s always had a pale complexion, but her current colouring is enough to start concerning him. 

“But what if Emma has her? You already lost her once.” 

He never thought he’d see the day where someone else was more worried about Jess going missing than he is. Though he also never thought he’d love someone other than her. “She’ll be okay, she can look after herself.”

* * *

 

Jess finds them just as the doctor is finishing bandaging Lucy’s neck. She’s breathing heavy, and her cheeks are flushed. Emma clearly didn’t go easy on her.

“I’ve been looking for you guys everywhere.” Jess pants. “She got away. I’m sorry.”

Wyatt shakes his head, denying her apology. “Don’t be. You shouldn’t have gone after her alone in the first place.”

Jess shakes her head and huffs out a short laugh. “You’re forgetting that I’ve kicked your ass on more than one occasion. I can handle myself.”

“Wyatt’s right. Rittenhouse are dangerous, unpredictable, you could have been hurt.” Lucy knows more than anyone just what they’re capable of, though Jess doesn’t seem to be listening to a word they’re saying. 

“Look, I’m fine. Not a scratch on me.” She holds out her bare arms for them to inspect, like that will convince them to drop it. It won’t. “Can we just get out of here?”

Wyatt grabs the meds the doctor had left for Lucy, before he helps her up off the bed. “Yeah, Rufus called, said they’d done a scan across social media and found pictures of him at a high school party.”

“My first high school party.” Lucy mutters, as she follows Wyatt out of the hospital. “Better late than never, I suppose.”

Wyatt stops in his tracks at her words and turns to her in disbelief. “Your first? Ever?”

“How does that surprise you?” Lucy shrugs, unashamed. “I told you what I was like back in school.”

“You were the nerd that lived in the library, and didn’t go to prom because you had a spelling-bee the same night, weren’t you?” Jess asks.

Lucy had almost forgotten she was there - again - she really has to stop doing that. “Speech and debate tournament, but yeah.”

* * *

 

The party is a blur for Wyatt, much like the ones he’d attended when he was in high school himself; though for very different reasons. Back then he’d simply had too much whiskey. Now he just wishes that was the case. He could have lost Lucy back in that hospital. Emma came too close to ending his world, and to say that thought has shaken him and consumed him would be an understatement. He’s sure Lucy and Jess have been talking to him since, and he’s sure he’s responded to them, but he couldn’t tell you what was said or who said it. _Well, the debrief is going to be fun_ …

“I see not much has changed since we were in high school.” Jess remarks as a student empties the contents of her stomach. 

Wyatt only nods, absently, not quite sure what she just said. Neither Jess nor Lucy said anything, so he must have had the right reaction to whatever she said.

They’re getting some funny looks as they walk through the yard, they clearly don’t belong here. It’s only when they’re nearing the house, that one of the students shouts out “Hey! Somebody’s mom is here!”

Jess bites out a “Bite me!” in response, while Lucy brings one of her hands out from her pocket to point her thumb at the other woman. She stops suddenly when she realises that Jess isn’t the mother here. She is.

One thing Wyatt does remember is Lucy’s excitement over her cell phone. He doesn’t really know why it excites her, but the look on her face is enough to wipe away any lingering fear. If only for a moment. It all returns once he walks away and enters the house in search of Kennedy. _Why’d I leave her out there with Jess? Idiot._

It’s easier than he thought it would be to get the future president to return with them - ignoring the part where he runs off, and Wyatt gets into a shoot out with Emma in a room full of drunk high school students, of course.

* * *

 

Once they’re back in the bunker, Lucy makes a break for the bathroom first. She claims to need a shower, telling them she “feels icky after spending 3 days in bed sweating out a 17th century infection, and then running around in search of Kennedy all day.” They all buy it, never questioning her when she spends over an hour locked away in the bathroom.

Lucy tightens the belt on her robe, as she makes her way down the corridor towards her bunk. The door creaks loudly when she pushes it open, but not loud enough to drown out the sound of Wyatt telling Jess he loves her. They must be in his and Rufus’s room across the hall - it’s as private as they’re going to get, when the only truly private room in this hell hole is occupied. His words cut right through her. The way he’d been with her at the hospital today gave her hope for them and their future. She’d had a moment of weakness, when she thought he’d just been caught up in the moment, and would go back to Jess as soon as everything went back to normal. But she’d pushed that thought to the back of her mind, and locked it away in her ‘thoughts I shouldn’t have but I worry too much’ box. It seems her brief worries were more valid than she first thought. 

She enters the room, but doesn’t bother locking herself away like she planned. She can’t sit here and listen to Wyatt profess his love for another woman. Hopefully Jiya will be up for bingeing some truly awful for them, yet delicious reality show.

* * *

 

Kennedy has been back in 1934 - where he belongs - for a few hours now. Wyatt’s been looking for Lucy for just as long. It’s not a huge bunker, so he doesn’t know how he hasn’t found her yet. He’s making his way down the corridor with their bunk rooms once again, when he hears voices drifting out of the girl’s room. He’d know one of those voices anywhere. He has every intention of going in there and asking to speak to Lucy in private, when her next words give him pause. 

“He loves her, Jiya, more than anything. He’s chosen her. Or he’s going to.”

The sorrow in her voice and the thought of her tearing up with this thought running through her mind breaks his heart. Wyatt doesn’t know what put that idea in her head, nothing he’s done since returning to the present and finding himself in this situation should have given her that impression. Certainly not the events at the hospital earlier. 

“What am I going to do? I can’t do this alone.” 

He doesn’t need to be in the room with her to know, that she’s rubbing a hand over her swelling stomach as she gives a voice to those words. That by ‘doing this alone’, she means raising their child alone.

He doesn’t intend to hear any more of their conversation - he doesn’t really want to -but the longer he stands here, the more he’s going to hear. She thinks he loves Jessica, more than he loves her. She thinks he’s chosen Jessica over her. She thinks he’s going to make her raise their child alone. He doesn’t know what he did to give her that impression, but the thought sickens him. Unable to hear another word, he makes a break for the bathroom at the end of the hall, throwing himself at the toilet and emptying the meagre contents of his stomach. _I have to fix this. I have to._


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It’s a surprise to both of them when Wyatt lowers his weapon. Agent Christopher is threatening to court-marshal him if he doesn’t take the shot, but he takes his ear piece out and ignores her. There’s something in Carol’s eyes, and in the way that she talks about Lucy, that screams at Wyatt. He can save her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apparently, I'm now the kind of person that updates within a week... 
> 
> I'm really not though, so don't get used to this. Updating again this soon is just as much a surprise to me, as I'm sure it is to you. 
> 
> The events of this chapter are both exactly the same as 2x06 and different. I apologise for basically re-writing the episode, so feel free to just skim this chapter. Something Wyatt does on his solo mission took me by surprise though. It certainly wasn't in the episode, nor in my plan for this fic so I'm going to have to go back to the drawing board (thanks, Wyatt...) and figure out where I want to take it now.
> 
> Enjoy! xo

It’s rare for Wyatt to get a full nights worth of restful sleep - a full nights worth of any kind of sleep really. Even more so since they moved into this hell hole. Last night, he couldn’t even bring himself to close his eyes and try. Laying there wide awake, all he could hear were Lucy’s words from the night before: “He loves her. He’s chosen her.” He can’t even begin to imagine what images his brain would have conjured up to torture him with had he fallen asleep the night before. 

He gives up around sun rise, careful not wake Rufus as he gathers a change of clothes and his shower kit. Once he’s freshly showered and changed, Wyatt heads for the common area. He probably should have taken more care not to wake Flynn - who had been moved onto the sofa when Jess had joined them - but he doesn’t. 

Wyatt’s not sure how long he’s been up - he does know he’s on his third cup of coffee though - when Lucy comes shuffling into the room. He’s sat in one of the arm chairs, with Flynn glaring daggers at him, presumably for waking him at some point; his eyes follow her, as she makes her way to the kitchenette intent on making her own cup of coffee. When he sees her hand reach for the rusty machine, he shoots up and dashes across the kitchen to grab the pot from her. He doesn’t know much about pregnancy, but he does know that caffeine isn’t allowed. 

“What are you doing?” She turns to glare at him. 

He puts the pot back down and instead turns to grab one of Jiya’s herbal teas. She can have this, can’t she? “You’re pregnant. You can’t have coffee.”

Lucy ignores the tea bag he’s holding out to her, and instead picks up the coffee pot and pours herself half a cup. “Michelle said I’m okay with no more than half a cup every morning. You are not depriving me of this, Wyatt Logan.”

Dropping the tea bag back into the box, Wyatt steps back and holds his hands up in surrender. He’s seen her without her morning coffee, it’s not something he’s eager to see again. A part of him is worried about her, and the baby, and what the caffeine will do to them - all he’s ever heard is that pregnant women shouldn’t have coffee or caffeine in any form - but he trusts Michelle, and if she says it’s okay, then who is he to stand between Lucy and her morning coffee. 

He watches her as she takes her first sip; the look of contentment on her face, one he wishes more than anything he was responsible for. “I... Uh...” Wyatt doesn’t quite know what to say. He knows he should say something - needs to say something. They need to clear the air. They need to be honest with each other about what they want, about how they’ve been feeling, and how they’re currently feeling. But how does he tell her he heard what she said last night, without her getting mad at him?

“You... Uh... What?” Lucy cocks an eyebrow at him. 

He sighs. There’s no other way to phrase this. It’s best just to rip the band aid straight off. “Look, what I’m about to say is probably going to piss you off - and thats the last thing I want to do - but it needs to be said so we can-” 

He stops short when an alarm sounds, echoing through the bunker. Rittenhouse. The room is suddenly flooding with people. Rufus and Jiya head for the computers, typing away to figure out where and when they’re headed. Flynn sits up and throws his blanket to the end of the sofa, his glare now directed at the computers, rather than at the back of Wyatt’s head. Mason stubbles in, a bottle clutched in one hand and throwing the other about wildly - they don’t bother trying to decipher his drunken slurs, instead leaving him to flop down on Flynn’s recently vacated bed. 

The main door creaks open as Agent Christopher arrives, though none of them hear the door or her hurried footsteps over the sound of the alarm still sounding. She struggles to make herself heard. “Where are they?”

“San Antonio, 1936.” Jiya reads from the monitor. “Uh, November 23.”

All eyes turn to Lucy, expecting her to know the answer as always. She shrugs helplessly. “What!? I don’t know every single thing that happened at every point in history.”

“You gonna make yourself useful?” Wyatt turns to Flynn. “Or did we break you out of prison for nothing?”

He shrugs. “I would if I could. Like Lucy, I don’t know everything.”

A drunken slur that sounds a little like ‘hotel’ comes from somewhere near the living area.

Agent Christopher heads towards the drunken ex-billionaire and snatches the bottle from his hands. “You want to try that again?”

“You lot are hopeless.” Mason sits up with a groan. “The Gunter hotel.”

He’s met with a room full of blank looks, eliciting another groan. “In that hotel, on November 23, 1936, Robert Johnson and Don Law… changed the world.”

“How?” Wyatt’s skepticism is felt by everyone else in the room. 

“By recording a series of albums.”

“Why would Rittenhouse care about that?” Rufus remarks.

Mason stands from where he’d flopped down onto the sofa and turns to Agent Christopher. “These are the people you chose to save the world?”

Flynn snarks in return. “This is the guy that built a time machine?”

“Just tell us what you know.” Christopher snaps at him, no time for his snark, or his drunken state. 

“Robert Johnson!? The king of the delta blues, the father of rock ‘n’ roll?” Again, Mason is met by nothing but blank looks. “Philistines! The lot of you!”

“You need to stop drinking.” It’s not often that Wyatt agrees with Flynn... This is one of those rare moments. “Why would Rittenhouse go after some blues singer?”

“ _The_ blues singer.” Mason rises from the sofa, walking closer to the group. He reminds Wyatt a lot of Lucy in this moment, as he lectures them on just who Robert Johnson is and what he did for the music industry. “If it weren’t for Robert Johnson, there’d be no modern blues, no rock ‘n’ roll. None of your Elvis, Beatles, Stones, Zeppelin. None of them.”

“Which is bad, no doubt. No one wants to listen to Pat Boone on the radio 24/7.” Rufus steps down the from console and approaches Mason. “But I think we’re all missing the larger, geopolitical point here.”

“No, no. Mason’s right.” Wyatt turns and frowns at Lucy. He didn’t peg her for such a fan of music. “It wouldn’t just be Rittenhouse killing rock ‘n’ roll at its source. They’d be killing the cultural revolution of the 1960s. The civil rights movement, the fall of Nixon, the end of the Vietnam war. The counterculture as we know it.”

Seeing her begin to spiral, Wyatt takes a step forward and attempts to calm Lucy down. She steps away from him before he can really do anything. “We need to go. Now.”

“No arguments from me. Get going.” Agent Christopher orders as she heads towards Flynn.

“Fourth seats ready, I say Connor takes it.” Rufus says, heading for the Lifeboat to begin preparing for take off. 

“Nope. No, not happening.” Mason refuses. “Absolutely not.”

Hearing his refusal, Rufus stops flicking what seems to be every switch on the control panel and climbs back out. “You know more about Robert Johnson and his albums than any of us...”

Mason shrugs and gestures to the bottle he’d snatched back up, like being drunk will have them change their minds about him going. He clearly doesn’t know that Wyatt was drunk on their first trip to the Hindenburg. “I’ll debrief Lucy, while you prepare to Launch.”

It’s Flynn that steps forward and figures out exactly why Mason is so against traveling with them. He’s afraid of riding in his own invention. Wyatt kicks himself as he puts he pieces together. It’s obvious now that he thinks about it.

“Wait. All those test trips before we met you? And you never once time travelled yourself?” Lucy’s incredulous. So is everyone else.

“Well, it is bloody dangerous!” It’s a poor defence. Mason knows it, but he tries it anyway.

“Yeah, I know!” Lucy cries, as Flynn just laughs, and Wyatt and Rufus exchange disbelieving looks. How did this guy ever build a time machine?

“And perhaps Rufus and Jiya have made the correct calculations for the fourth seat.” He’s grasping at straws now. “But, consider this… perhaps they haven’t.”

“Okay, that’s enough.” Everyone stops bickering and turns to Agent Christopher when she raises her voice. She’s met with all the protests and arguments from Rufus and Wyatt that she expects, as she presents a gun to Flynn; and tells them that he will be accompanying Mason, Rufus, and Lucy on this mission. She has a special mission for Wyatt here in the present, she tells them, though that does nothing to ease their concerns. 

Lucy spares Wyatt a quick glance, as she brushes past him and follows a gleeful - no one should be that pleased to receive a gun - Flynn to the Lifeboat. Rufus follows, dragging a still protesting Connor Mason with him. Wyatt thought that going on a mission without Lucy - or her going without him - was as bad things could get, now they’d been forced from their homes and their lives, and into this bunker. Though he’s soon realising that Lucy going on a mission with a drunk and a terrorist without him is much, much worse.

* * *

 

“What the hell do you think you’re doing!? Sending my team out there with a drunk and a terrorist?” Wyatt turns on Agent Christopher as soon as the Lifeboat blinks out of the present. “If anything happens to them...” He lets the threat- he doesn’t know what just yet - hang ominously between them.

“I’m thinking that I want to end this once and for all. And I’m thinking that you are the only person with the skills to do so, that I trust to get the job done.” She smirks at him. “How does that sound to you, Master Sergeant?”

He nods slowly. Rittenhouse have been nothing but a thorn in his side from day one - more so since they were forced to move into this underground tin can. If he can end this here, now, he won’t say no. “What do you have in mind?”

As she tells him her plan, he likes the idea less and less. Of course, he wants to get rid of them for good, but he’d also like to be here for the birth of his child. Jiya’s right, this is a suicide mission. He should listen to her, tell Agent Christopher no or at least argue for backup. But he figures that he’s faced worse odds before, and if it’ll end this today, then it’s worth it. For Lucy, for his child. For his family. 

Wyatt finds himself at what seems to be an abandoned warehouse around an hour away from their bunker. He weaves between stacks of boxes - holding god-knows what, and that have been there for god-knows how long - his rifle held in front of him, ready to fire at anything that moves. He’s just finishing his last sweep of the building, when out of know where he’s jumped upon from above by someone he can only assume is Rittenhouse. The guy knocks Wyatt to the ground, and he looses his grip on his gun. It doesn’t clatter to the other side of the room though, thanks to the strap he has around him. The two struggle for a moment, before Wyatt kicks out at his chest as hard as he can, sending the other guy stumbling off of him. While he gets his balance and regains his footing, Wyatt snatches up his rifle and sends two shots at the guy’s chest. He drops easily. 

Wyatt has Jiya and Agent Christopher screaming in his ear, asking for an update - his head cam must have broken in the struggle - but he ignores them as he takes a second to catch his breath. Until Jiya uses some rather colourful language, and he figures he better answer them before Jiya comes down here and checks on him. “I’m good. Better than this dick.”

Christopher is asking if he has anything on him, but Wyatt’s way ahead of her, already patting him down and digging through his pockets. He pulls out a set of keys with some kind of fob attached. He doesn’t think anything of them, until Jiya asks if there’s a serial number on the fob. Wyatt turns it over in his fingers and reads it out to her. He can hear her and Agent Christopher talking about some kind of security firm and firewalls, but he tunes them out as his mind wanders to Lucy, and how she and Rufus are doing without him. He hopes they’re doing better than he is right now.

* * *

 

An hour since he arrived back at the bunker is yet to pass, when Jiya is calling out that she’s already hacked the fob. 

“You okay to head back out there?” Agent Christopher asks him. 

He wants to say no, to tell her to go herself. But then he catches sight of Lucy’s mug from this morning across the room, and he can’t say the words he wants to. He has to be the one to finish this, so he simply nods his head and snatches up his rifle and helmet. 

They send him to another abandoned warehouse, only this one isn’t abandoned. This one has cream marble walls and plush carpets in a red-brown colour that reminds him a little of dried blood. This is the place. He has guys coming at him and shooting at him from every angle this time. It’s a struggle, but he takes them out one by one. It’s a huge building - much bigger than it looks to be from the outside - and he’s not quite sure how he’s made it to what seems to be the main room in the building so quickly, but it’s there in front of him. The Mothership. And for the first time he wishes he knew how to fly the damn thing. He can only imagine the look on Lucy’s and Rufus’s faces if they were to come home to find the Mothership there in the bunker. 

With flying it home not being an option, Wyatt reaches for a couple of grenades from where they hang on a belt around his waist. Christopher wasn’t happy about him bringing them, but he wasn’t coming without them. Though he never imagined he’d be using them to blow up the other time machine.

He’s about to pull them out and unpin them when a figure moves into his line of sight. Wyatt forgets the grenades and grabs up his gun, taking aim. But when he sees exactly who is stood in front of him he freezes. He has Agent Christopher screaming in his ear to take the shot and take her out, but he can’t. He can’t do that to Lucy.

“Master Sergeant Wyatt Logan, I presume?” She’s calmer than she should be, considering all the chaos surrounding them. 

He nods slowly, eyeing her cautiously. “Carol Preston. Lucy’s mom.”

She hums her acquiescence. “How is my daughter? Emma tells me she’s pregnant?”

He stays silent. 

“Believe it or not, Mr. Logan,” Carol sighs. “I still care about Lucy. I don’t want to see any harm come to her.”

“Salem says otherwise.” His finger twitches on the trigger. 

“That was not my choice. I made them let me handle that mission so I could save Lucy.”

It’s a surprise to both of them when Wyatt lowers his weapon. Agent Christopher is threatening to court-marshal him if he doesn’t take the shot, but he takes his ear piece out and ignores her. There’s something in Carol’s eyes, and in the way that she talks about Lucy, that screams at Wyatt. He can save her. “Come with me.”

She’s taken aback by his words and he expects no less. He expects her to refuse immediately, to start telling him how Rittenhouse are doing great things for the world, and how Lucy will soon realise that she is destined to be here right along side her. Instead she’s quiet. 

“Lucy’s told me a lot about you. How much you love history... How much you loved her.” He watches her carefully. One wrong word and he’ll blow any chance he has of bringing her back. “Think about how much you claim to love your daughter. And think about how what you’re doing here, is doing to her.”

“It’s not that simple.” It’s a weak protest, they both know it. Her fear - he assumes of Rittenhouse, and what they would do to her and those she loves, if she did betray them - is written all over her face. 

“Sure it is.” He sounds more confident than he feels..

“How do you even know you can trust me?” He can see she’s seriously considering his offer.

“I don’t trust you.” He shrugs. It’s not the most encouraging thing to say to persuade her, but it’s the truth. “But Lucy does. She still believes you can be saved.”

“And you believe in her.” She nods thoughtfully. 

“More than anything.” He wears his heart on his sleeve when it comes to Lucy, he always has. It’s a weakness, he knows it is, but one that may work to his advantage here. “I love her… I know you love her too, and we’ve both done nothing but hurt her recently. I’m trying to fix things with her. This is your last chance to do the same.”

Carol stands and regards him silently. She opens her mouth to respond to him when Emma and Nicholas come charging into the room, guns blazing. He doesn’t know if Carol follows him because she wants to, or because bullets are flying in their direction and she’s trying to avoid getting hit; but she’s clutching at the back of his vest and following him, rather than pulling out her own gun and firing at him also, so he takes it as a win. 

He yanks open the passenger door and urges her into the car. Even while being shot at, he can’t help but let the gentlemanly habits, that his grandpa Sherwin had ingrained into him from a young age, take over. 

“What are you doing!? Drive!” She screams at him, as he just sits and looks at her when he climbs into the car himself. 

“If you hurt Lucy - intentionally or not - I won’t hesitate.” He threatens, before he turns the engine on and speeds away.

* * *

 

Jiya and Agent Christopher have a few choice words to share with the both of them when they arrive back at the bunker. To say they’re both furious with him would be an understatement. Carol asks to speak to Agent Christopher in private. Jiya tells her not to listen to her, to just arrest her and be done with it. She goes despite her protestations, and when they return 15 minutes later, she’s in a much better mood - even laughing with Carol. Jiya still isn’t happy. 

Wyatt starts down the corridor to the bunks, intent on changing out of his combat gear and grabbing a shower before the Lifeboat returns, but it seems fate or the force, or whatever it is that Lucy believe in, has other ideas. He turns back and joins Jiya up at the console - Carol and Agent Christopher are stood just bellow them talking like old friends. He doesn’t quite know how Lucy is going to react when she sees her mother stood here in the bunker, waiting to welcome her home. He just hopes he’s done the right thing in changing her mind and bringing her here. He just hopes Lucy is happy to see her.

Wyatt holds his breath, as the rings stop spinning and the door slides open. They’re all eager to not only see their team return safely, but also to see Lucy’s reaction when she sees her mother. The travellers are all smiles and laughter when they emerge, too caught up in whatever has them so happy to notice the extra body in the room. Until Lucy steps out of the Lifeboat and takes in the sight of her mother stood before her. 

“Mom!?”


End file.
